Chapel of Santa Crescenzia - San Vito lo Capo

The origin of San Vito Lo Capo is linked to an ancient legend that tells the story of a young Roman patrician , the son of a high-ranking official of ancient Rome.
One day, in order to escape the persecutions of Diocletian , the young man decided to flee Mazzara, his native city, together with his nurse Crescentia and his tutor Modestus, who had converted him to Christianity.
After a few days of sailing towards the northern coast of Sicily, the three are caught in a storm that forces them to go ashore in a gulf sheltered from the wind, known to sailors of the time as Egitarso or Egitallo. Here the three stop and try to convert the inhabitants of the village of Conturrana to Christianity.
However, Vito, Modesto and Crescenzia do not succeed, on the contrary, they are chased away and threatened by them.
It was then that a huge landslide buried the village and its inhabitants. The terrible news reached the whole island and reminded the people of a divine punishment.

If you arrive in San Vito Lo Capo by car, even today you can see a large landslide area traced back to these events, called Contrada Valanga and a few hundred meters away a chapel dedicated to Santa Crescenzia , built by the inhabitants of Erice in the 16th century.

Willem Vandenameele